Tim Wakefield hangs it up

The difficult thing to remember about Tim Wakefield, after 16 long years of pitching for the Red Sox, is that when he arrived he was a sensation. For so long he was a (usually) reliable back of the rotation guy, that we forget he started with the Sox in 1995 with a 14 and one record.

A friend and I went that summer to see him, and it was like nothing we’d ever seen before. You get so used to professional pitchers throwing very hard that seeing Wakefield was like watching a guy warm-up. There was something effortless and easy about the motion, a game of soft-toss with a live batter in the way. The only strain you saw was from the batter, winding up and swatting desperately like an impatient little-leaguer.

That certainly was a long time ago — I remember that game was saved by Stan Belinda, who I remember being pretty optimistic about. That was the great false dawn for the team, when it felt like the “Curse” (if you will) was in danger. There was something very different about Fenway back then — it was long before the extensive upgrades that turned it into a slightly less uncomfortable and ancient place. There was something ferociously locked-in about the crowd in those days — a feeling lost since 2004. Sitting in those cramped narrow seats, it felt like everyone was leaning forward and holding their breath for each pitch. And since a 64 m.p.h. knuckleball took longer to get there, the feeling was drawn out just a bit when Wakefield pitched.

His decision to retire last week is another part of sorting out the wreckage of last season. As I mentioned in an earlier post, I managed to miss the horrid end of last season, so I’m not really in the panic mode of thought a lot of friends are. But it does seem that cutting ties with the past is a vital part of moving forward. There seems to be a consensus that there was a lack of leadership in the clubhouse last year, which would reflect badly on the two longest time-servers, Wakefield and Jason Varitek.

But nothing that happened in 2011 can beat those memories of watching Wakefield. There are a few moments that everyone remembers. We all know that he threw the pitch to Aaron Boone in the 2003 ALCS, probably the worst moment in Sox history. And no one blames him because he was out there as the workhorse of the team. Just like he was in Game 3 of the 2004 ALCS, when he was called on to slop up several innings of a depressing blow-out against the Yankees, which rested the staff to fight another day, which became the greatest comeback in baseball history.

In his time at Fenway Wakefield did everything. Starter, long reliever, even closer for a spell. I’ll always remember him as a fifth starter, and it was nice to know that every fifth game would be something completely different. And considering how much he has done, how much more he might have left, a part of me worries it might have been worth the risk to have him back for another season.